1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to laser alignment techniques, and more specifically, it relates to the control of the wavefront of a laser in real time.
2. Description of Related Art
All lasers, including high-power, solid-state lasers, need a means of alignment. For low-power, continuous wave (cw) lasers, this may mean a trivial tilting of mirrors while the laser is in operation. For high-power lasers, especially pulsed, high-power lasers, it is not, in general, practical to align the system, at least initially, with the high-power beam. For this reason and for reasons of wavefront control, it is often desirable to employ an alignment laser of much lower power. It is desirable to inject the alignment laser into the high-power beam path and couple it back out in a manner that both maximizes the fidelity to the true high-power beam path and minimizes the impact on the performance of the high-power laser.